In a typical inkjet recording or printing system, ink droplets are ejected from a nozzle at high speed towards a recording element or medium to produce an image on the medium. The ink droplets, or recording liquid, generally comprise a recording agent, such as a dye or pigment, and a large amount of solvent. The solvent, or carrier liquid, typically is made up of water, an organic material such as a monohydric alcohol, a polyhydric alcohol or mixtures thereof.
An inkjet recording element typically comprises a support having on at least one surface thereof at least one ink-receiving or image-forming layer and includes those intended for reflection viewing, which have an opaque support, and those intended for viewing by transmitted light, which have a transparent support.
An inkjet recording element that simultaneously provides an almost instantaneous ink dry time and good image quality is desirable. However, given the wide range of ink compositions and ink volumes that a recording element needs to accommodate, these requirements of inkjet recording media are difficult to achieve simultaneously.
Inkjet recording elements are known that employ porous or non-porous single layer or multilayer coatings that act as suitable ink receiving layers on one or both sides of a porous or non-porous support. Recording elements that use non-porous coatings typically have good image quality and stability but exhibit poor ink dry time. Recording elements that use porous coatings typically contain colloidal particulates and have poorer image stability but exhibit superior dry times.
While a wide variety of different types of porous image recording elements for use with inkjet printing are known, there are many unsolved problems in the art and many deficiencies in the known products, which have severely limited their commercial usefulness. A major challenge in the design of a porous image-recording layer is to be able to obtain good quality, crack-free coatings. Inkjet prints, prepared by printing onto inkjet recording elements, are subject to environmental degradation. They are especially vulnerable to light fade and fade resulting from gaseous impurities in the air, such as ozone and nitrous oxide. Highly swellable hydrophilic layers can take an undesirably long time to dry, slowing printing speed. Porous layers speed the absorption of the ink vehicle, but often suffer from insufficient gloss and severe dye fade. Porous layers are also difficult to coat without cracking.
Japanese Kokai 07-137432 describes an inkjet paper having an ink-absorbing layer containing polyester resin particles with internal pores. However, there is a problem with this element in that the average particle size of the polyester resin is greater than 0.5 microns, and the element will have low surface gloss.
It is an object of this invention to provide an inkjet recording element which will provide rapid ink uptake speed. Another objective of the invention is to provide an inkjet recording element having high surface gloss. Another objective of the invention is to provide an inkjet recording element having a receiving layer that when printed upon has an excellent image quality and stability.